Mindfulness Mental Training Eases Anxiety and Depression

Mental training based on mindfulness – or an emotional self-regulating tool consisting of a focus on what we are doing, thinking about or feeling at every moment – helps to fight against psychological diseases such as anxiety, depression, concern or complaints about health.

According to a doctoral thesis from the University of Granada and summarized in a Science Daily post, psychological diseases are very common among secondary education teachers. Mental training based on mindfulness may offer an answer as it has been proven to be very positive for emotional regulation.

The psycho-physiological mechanisms related to mindfulness were analyzed in this research. The thesis also evaluated the effectiveness of a training program that works as an emotional self-regulating tool.

The research work was developed by Luis Carlos Delgado Pastor and supervised by professor Jaime Vila Castellar, of the department of Personality, Assessment and Psychological Treatment.

Pastor was able to confirm the effectiveness of training mindfulness abilities as it was applied to two different groups with defined features. The first group consisted of 20 girls with a high-level of concern, while the other group was made up of 25 secondary education teachers.

As a result of the mental training, both groups were able to improve their subjective rates of anxiety, depression, concern, complaints about health and emotional regulation. Pastor noted the improvement of the “effectiveness of training mindfulness abilities and human values in the teaching sector as an emotional self-regulating tool, stress prevention for teachers and students, as well as to facilitate the teaching-learning process.”

UGR researchers also note that the mindfulness approach can apply for those individuals who are suffering specific emotional processes, including chronic concern, anxiety and depression.